


Wrappings

by yuletide_archivist



Category: Vorkosigan Saga - Lois McMaster Bujold
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-12-22
Updated: 2004-12-22
Packaged: 2018-01-25 07:04:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,078
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1638035
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yuletide_archivist/pseuds/yuletide_archivist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Written for Ekaterinn</p>
    </blockquote>





	Wrappings

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Ekaterinn

 

 

Bel Thorne has known Miles Naismith for six years, and worked closely with him for three. Bel has plenty of ideas about what to do next with him.

Rather too many, really. Some of them are so excruciatingly embarrassing that Bel would very much rather do without them. Those are the ones that present themselves in the depths of the sleep shift, when Bel is too tired to sleep again, or sick and groggy with painkillers, and some protective layer of sense and reason slips away. Such dreams, Bel knows perfectly well, should be left decently behind with the rest of adolescence. They are painfully unsubtle, pathetic reminders of so much that Bel likes to think it has grown out of. In them, Miles and Bel romp indestructibly together through unlikely and often rather sketchily imagined adventures, exchanging quips, blasting down their enemies, protecting children and small animals, saving whole worlds even. Bel saves the day or Miles' life, occasionally, gloriously, at cost of its own. And, always, at the heart of the fantasy - returned to time and time again through a night of tossing and turning - is the moment when Miles turns to Bel and looks into its eyes. Miles' gaze is intense and penetrating as always, but this time he really, finally, sees it, sees right through to the very core of Bel's self, and his gray eyes crinkle in pleasure, and for a moment, just a moment, he is lost for words. And then Miles tells Bel that it is wonderful. How he has never respected or loved anyone more, how Bel is clever and brave and has sexy hands and is impressively good at unarmed combat, and how they should spend the rest of their lives together (or sometimes there is a funeral-speech version, where Miles movingly explains to a tearful crowd how much he regrets that they won't be able to). Sometimes Miles promotes Bel to be his co-Admiral of the Dendarii fleet, and lately he nearly always buys it one of the new Escobaran Martillo class cruisers with the extra color capacity in the Necklin drive. Usually then Commodore Tung nods curtly, jealous as hell, but forced to admit the rightness of it all, and there is general rejoicing, a whole universe full of people happy for them, hugging them and patting them on the back, wishing them well and admiring them heartily.

Most of the time, though, Bel is at peace with its needy inner child and knows how to acknowledge and enjoy the many successes of its adult life. Most of the time, the level-headed Captain Thorne enjoys a good night's sleep in its cabin aboard the sleek and desirable _Ariel_ , remains clear about just how unromantic the life of a mercenary is, and avoids unnecessary shooting almost as assiduously as it avoids children and small animals. Most of the time it has no difficulty at all in restricting its imagination to wholesome, adult and potentially realizable daydreams about its commanding officer.

"Let's have sex!" Miles usually says at the start of these fantasies, grinning madly and throwing his arms up in his enthusiasm. "What a great idea!" Bel generally cries in response, and flings itself at him immediately, because, lets face it, Bel has been waiting for this for years now, and even in daydreams is pretty damn keen to get down to business. Bel likes to imagine ripping at Miles' uniform with all the excitement of a child unwrapping a Foundation Day gift ( _Miles smirks rakishly and mutters something about encouraging his officers to use their initiative_ ), likes to imagine urgent kisses given and returned ( _Miles pulls Bel's mouth down to meet his_ ), _really_ likes to imagine them both lying together, naked and happy ( _Miles smiles while Bel trails kisses over him, breathing in his scent and feasting its eyes on him_ ). What happens next depends. Bel wants to do everything with Miles, and everything to Miles, wants to explore every conceivable sexual act with this man who has always seemed to make all things possible. It wants it so much that occasionally the detailed fantasy stalls here, while Bel's mind hovers in happy indecision over the very long list of things that it can conceive. Mostly, though, Bel's natural decisiveness has no trouble at all in asserting itself at this point.

Last night, Bel drifted off to sleep imagining itself wrapped in Miles' arms, his hand cupped around its left breast. This morning, standing in front of the tiny mirror in the washroom, it strikes Bel that its breasts really could stand a little more attention. Maybe it has been doing them something of a disservice these last few years. It has been playing them down - wearing practical but rather flattening underwear - dressing to look as uncomplicatedly male as possible without actively hiding its female attributes. That isn't, Bel realizes, something it had consciously decided to do. But Miles always responds more openly, and just plain more, to Bel when he can subconsciously categorize it as male. Bel knows that the masculine style of camaraderie and rapport they have developed is something special, something precious, something that few ever get to experience. And that rapport is important to it beyond words. But Bel has always felt that so close and trusting a relationship ought to be able to lead to something closer still, something with sex in it. Bel has been assuming that the better Captain Thorne and Admiral Naismith get at working together, the closer Bel's dreams are getting to reality. But this morning Bel realizes for the first time that maybe this isn't so. Miles doesn't seem to care much for femininity, but he undeniably responds to women sexually. His rapport with Elli Quinn isn't nearly as strong as what Bel and Miles have together, but sometimes it looks a whole lot more like flirting.

So, maybe Bel has been playing this wrong all along. After all, if Bel ever wants Miles to play with its breasts, it's going to have to make him notice them first. Perhaps it needs to play up the female just a bit more. And maybe, since their working relationship is so solidly established, Miles can stand to be shaken up a bit now. Apart from anything else, he's just so darn cute when he's off-balance.

Bel rummages in one of the cubbyholes at the back of the closet, and finds one of its old bras. The bra is practical rather than erotic, plain and unadorned, but it will hold Bel's breasts up rather than squashing them down. Then Bel picks out the single one of its gray-and-white jackets that has the dart coming out from the sideseam. The cut of this jacket is only a little different from that of the other two - Dendarii women's uniforms do not unduly emphasize the wearer's figure - but, with the bra, there should definitely be an impact, if a somewhat subtle one. That's fine. Subtle is what's wanted. Bel grins suddenly at that thought, and rifles though one of the drawers under the mirror. Eventually the little canister turns up right at the back, the logo _Subtle_ emerging with appropriate restraint from a tasteful lilac and silver floral design. Bel touches the nozzle to the nape of its neck. Then, quickly, finishes dressing, checks in the mirror, nods in sardonic satisfaction at what it sees, and heads out.

******

Admiral Naismith's shuttle from the Escobaran orbital station is delayed by worse than usual traffic snarls, which means Bel turns out to be early for the conference instead of ten minutes late. Tung, who does not seem to be having one of his better days, makes it clear that visiting captains will not be required in the docking bay when the Admiral is formally piped aboard the Triumph (Bel produces a knowing smile when Tung announces this, mostly to annoy him). So Bel is already leaning against the door of the Triumph's briefing room when the procession comes down the corridor. It had expected Miles to be striding out front, all forward momentum and suppressed excitement, the way he usually is with a new contract. But the first to come around the corner is in fact Corporal Fedori, rushing ahead with his hands full of flimsies and data disks. Then comes the smaller figure of Miles himself, walking fast, but half turned around and gesticulating expansively to his batman, who peels off from the party and heads down a side corridor. The usual suspects - Tung, Quinn, Bothari-Jesek and her husband - and some of Tung's staff are following briskly after him. Their faces are aglow, their body language reflecting the energy of the Admiral's, transmuted and variously expressed according to their own natures.

It seems to Bel that Miles is like a sandstorm in the desert. He springs up out of nowhere, and suddenly the landscape is energized, animated, his people dancing and whirling around him, feeding his energy as they are sucked in towards the center. It's a dangerous thing to be part of, Bel knows that perfectly well, but the storm is beautiful and exciting and it's impossible not to want to be swept up in it. Bel straightens its spine and takes a step backwards, saluting as Miles passes through the door into the briefing room, receiving a salute and a smile in return. Then it surrenders itself to the whirlwind and joins the group following Miles through the door. The other shipmasters are already standing behind their places at the table, saluting.

The briefing is something of a disappointment. The Admiral reports that there is no new fleetwide contract as yet, although confidential negotiations with several parties are continuing and the outcome will be known within the next ten days. Bel has been around plenty long enough to know that can't be right - Miles' whole demeanor says that something big, something exciting is up, and Miles is already formulating a plan. But it's clear that Miles is going to stick to the story, and the meeting works its way through a routine series of status reports from the officers present, with progress reports from the two ships out on detached duty (on the dullest of escort contracts, both of them).

Nothing interesting happens until the budget update. As Lieutenant Bone finishes talking them through the blowout in Engineering's operating costs over the last quarter, Miles smoothly thanks her, and looks across the table to make twinkling eye contact with Baz Jesek.

"Engineering have made excellent progress in dealing with the damage we took at Segonia. I commend Commander Jesek and his team for their success in achieving the quarter's maintenance targets in spite of the forty percent increase in demand for repairs." Baz nods professionally, and manages not to twinkle too obviously back, despite knowing what really happened at Segonia. But Miles is gazing around the table, and the twinkle is now for all and sundry. He looks like a kindly uncle about to offer his nieces and nephews a treat.

"We took a beating, but you should have seen the other guy. We spent a lot of ordnance at Segonia. Our current ten day window of fleetwide downtime provides an opportunity to catch up on inventory. You'll need to update your supply orders with Accounting within the next twelve hours. The good news is that despite Segonia, there's a little more slack in the global budget than we originally projected for this stage of the cycle, so there are dollars to spend. Each ship and each Fleet executive unit will have a ten percent bonus available for either inventory or Schedule B capital improvements. Go look at your wish lists, people, it's, uh, the gift-giving season of your choice."

Miles takes a breath and jerks his chin up, and his eyes meet Bel's, and Bel knows that whatever's up, this is it.

"In that spirit, I intend to oversee this little shopping trip myself. Purchasing have determined that a Jackson's Whole-based supplier offers the Fleet the best cost/completeness ratio in this sector. Captain Thorne. Given the current status of our contract negotiations, it would be advantageous to minimize travel time, and the _Ariel_ is our fastest ship. I'd like to break orbit fifteen hours from now."

"We can be ready for you within the hour, sir" says Bel, all agog. But there's no more.

"Just so," says the Admiral, and dismisses them. He has a brief word with Corporal Fedori, and then turns to consult with Bothari-Jesek about something, their heads nodding together seriously as the rest of his officers push back their chairs and file out of the briefing room. Bel pauses, wondering whether to try and pump Miles for information now, or wait until he's safe aboard the Ariel. Then Elena glances over, and Miles' eyes follow hers.

"Bel," he says with a smile. It's a different smile, a less business-like one, but it's still saying _I know something you don't know_. "My batman's getting my kit over to the Ariel now. I thought I might come back with you on your shuttle."

"Suits me," it replies. "Then I can ask you some more about this inventory mission."

"Ah yes, there will of course be a more detailed briefing when we get over. Actually, Bel, I was, er, hoping I could commandeer the Ariel's wardroom for a more ... personal ... gathering first."

Bel raises its eyebrows in genuine surprise. "You know you don't have to ask. But, personal?"

The meeting room is obviously empty but for Miles, Bel and Elena, but Miles' eyes dart around to check it nonetheless. When he replies it is with his other voice, the one Bel has hardly ever heard, the guttural Barrayaran one that should make him look and sound like some cheesy holovid villain, except that if you're wrapped up in the Milesian charisma-field that's not what he looks and sounds like. Miles is leaning forwards, one arm extended, directing all that charisma in a focused beam at Bel. If Bel weren't sitting down, it would stagger back from the sheer force.

"Admiral Naismith may not, but ... anyone else, I think, does. There's a Barrayaran ... ceremony I need to perform, Bel. Nothing to do with the Dendarii. I would consider it a great honor if you would grant the boon of your hospitality."

"Sure," says Bel, confused and fascinated, rapt in Miles' gaze, but wondering what sort of weird stuff you might get at a Barrayaran ceremony, and in fact what the point of having the ceremony is. _Barrayarans do ancestor worship, don't they? And slit the throats of their own children_ , it can't help thinking, although Miles himself is living proof that that must be something the vids make up. "It'd be my honor to grant you that boon, Miles," it says, slightly satirically.

But Miles' face shows that Bel has somehow found exactly the right response. "I am in your debt," he says, the comic formality of the words and accent contrasting oddly with the familiar expression of delight he is wearing. "And it would give me great joy if you would join us, Bel."

For a moment, before Bel grins and accepts, it feels quite disoriented, dizzy at the thought of being pulled so far into the whirlwind that it will be able to glimpse what really lies inside the void at the center.

*******

Captain Thorne's shuttle turns out to be rather full on the return journey. Elli Quinn is invited too, it discovers with a stab of quickly-suppressed jealousy. Tung isn't, though, which probably explains why Miles wanted to use the Ariel and not the Triumph. Bel indulges itself by mentally chalking up a whole lot of points in their ongoing game of one-upmanship. Unfortunately, the crowded shuttle means there is no chance to grill Miles, about either mission or ceremony.

Admiral Naismith is still in his voluble, outgoing mood, and entertains the whole shuttle by telling them about a malfunctioning janitorial robot he encountered in a restaurant on Escobar.

At 1130 hours, with all the necessary preparations for the cruise to Jackson's Whole set in train, Bel makes its way from Nav and Com to the wardroom. Only Quinn is there, sitting at the table.

"So, has he told you what this so-called inventory mission really is yet?" she asks.

"He's been enjoying himself with the techs in Tactics since we got here," replies Bel. "Why don't you tell me, instead?"

She pushes herself back in her chair, and crosses her arms, a frown wrinkling her otherwise perfect brow. "Huh. He's playing this one close. In theory it could be just about anything, in that place. But in practice? I have no idea. What sort of Jacksonian contract would _Miles_ be prepared to accept, I wonder?"

Bel is about to observe that they'll find out in a few days' time, if not before, but is interrupted by the entry of Baz Jesek. Baz is still toting the shoulder bag he brought over on the shuttle, but he has wound a piece of cloth around his neck, and its ends hang down the front of his uniform jacket, splashes of bright red, the color of fresh arterial blood. Bel's eye is unavoidably drawn to the ritual garment, and it can't help thinking about those poor children again. _Maybe the throat-cutting is all symbolic, these days?_

Baz notices the stare, and shrugs diffidently as he sets his bag down on the table with a sinister clank.

"I thought I should try and get into the spirit of the thing," he says, tugging apologetically at the cloth. "I don't have anything else the right color. I haven't done this since I left Barrayar, Miles has never thought of it before."

Elena comes in behind him, carrying two covered trays, stacked one on the other. Bel observes that there are red stones in her earrings, but otherwise she looks just as usual.

"You know," she says, in exasperated tones, "if Miles had mentioned this idea of his a week ago, instead of yesterday in the transfer station dining room, we could have had more of the right food. There's hardly any point doing it without."

"If he'd told you a week ago, you would have refused to have anything to do with it by now," Baz tells her gently. At her sharp look, he adds, "I'm glad you chose to do this."

Elena sighs, and sets down the trays. The top one seems to contain a bowl of pap.

"Well, there's the traditional Winterfair gruel," she says, still sounding irritable, moving the bowl onto the table. "Or the closest the galley can turn out. Not that anyone ever actually wants to eat the poisonous stuff, but at least it's there." _Poison as well as knives?_ Bel wonders about the symbolism there. Maybe the Barrayarans just believe in being thorough.

The second tray is much more reassuring, full of delicious-looking pastries. "At least they had a good recipe for tart cases for the jam," says Elena, and she pushes the tray forward so that the pastries and the deadly bowl of gruel sit together at the center of the table. She sighs again, this time sounding more wistful than irritated. "There isn't much, is there? This isn't going to be much of a party."

Baz clears his throat a little. "I've got a couple of very good bottles, here, Elena," he suggests, and pulls them out from his bag. Bel is relieved to see that they are just bottles of wine. And not just _any_ bottles of wine, in fact, but a very respectable Escobaran appellation.

"I'll get the glasses," says Elli Quinn unexpectedly, and she goes over to the locker to fetch them. "Why don't you open those and let them breathe?"

"I'll just get the fire lit," replies Baz abstractedly, and looks up from the little metal tripod his bag has disgorged to find all eyes in the cabin riveted on him.

"Not in my ship, you don't," says Bel, firmly. Ceremony or no, Miles or no, some things are beyond the pale.

"It's all right. I've warned Environmental, and I've got smokeless fuel. You've got to have a fire in the house at Winterfair. All Barrayaran craft do."

"Fine, but not in my ship," repeats Bel with a little more edge. Baz looks around for support, and finds Elli looking suffused, and Elena worried. He reluctantly puts the tripod back in the bag and the bag on the floor.

"Let's have a glass of wine then," he says to Quinn. "Where's Miles, anyway?"

The door opens with a swish, and Miles appears on cue. He's carrying a bag too, and sweeps into the wardroom swinging it cheerily. "Good, good, you're all organized then," he carols.  
"Those brillberry tarts look wonderful." He's using his normal voice, Bel notices, and feels obscurely relieved. Miles looks expectantly around at them all for a moment, then  
waves his bag at them, and asks, "And what do you think I might have in here?"

Elena lets out a sudden laugh, as if she's just worked something out. After a moment she replies, in a rhetorical tone, "Why Miles! Do you think it's possible that Father Frost might bring gifts for us this Winterfair?"

Miles grins maniacally, and starts pulling brightly colored things out of his kit bag like a magician producing flags from a hat. "I think Father Frost might just manage that," he says, holding up a red tunic covered in bright green and silver embroidery, which, like most of the Barrayaran folk costumes Bel has seen in vids, still somehow manages to look military in style. "I had time to get a costume made on Escobar." Miles bounces a little. "I've always wanted to be Father Frost. I've never had the chance before." Elena bursts into laughter again, and Miles looks just a trifle abashed for a moment before he laughs with her.

Bel absently accepts a glass of wine and a pastry from Elli and watches Miles stripping off Admiral Naismith's gray and white jacket. Miles is bantering with Baz and Elena as he does so, and his Barrayaran accent creeps back as he tells Elena in tones of mock hurt that she never dared laugh at his grandfather when he dressed up as Father Frost. "I don't think anyone _ever_ dared laugh at your grandfather, Miles," replies Elena through her giggles. "Not even in _that_ hat."

Bel is usually as susceptible to Miles' glamor as the next person. But seeing him now, half undressed and surrounded by his closest friends, Bel is struck - as has occasionally happened before - by the realization that Miles is even smaller than he seems. Not just shorter, but also slighter, scrawnier, his youthful skin stretched too tightly over too spare a frame, the soft curve in his spine and the compensatory set of his shoulder blades adding to the impression of physical fragility. Bel watches as Miles don the faintly ridiculous tunic and a truly ridiculous cylindrical hat, and listens to his reminiscences of childhood Winterfair celebrations, and it really hits Bel, for the first time, that Miles is not just youthful but actually rather young. That he has only comparatively recently left adolescence, with all its embarrassments and disappointments, behind. Just then, of course, Miles turns to Bel and looks into its eyes.

Miles seems a little disconcerted by what he finds there, and for one off-balance instant he looks more vulnerable and more lovable than Bel has ever seen him. Then he sweeps a flowing white cloak around his shoulders, and bows with a lordly flourish. "Commander Quinn, Captain Thorne," he says in his formal Barrayaran tones, "Commander Jesek and Commander Bothari-Jesek. Father Frost, at your service." He shakes the remaining contents of his kit bag onto the table in front of him, and a number of small, colored packages fall out. "Bringing the gifts of the season to those who are most dear to me," Miles intones with mock solemnity, grinning at the two Barrayarans. Then he turns to Bel and Elli, and looks at them both utterly seriously. His head jerks up in the familiar tic, and he says with soft intensity: "The gifts are the token of the sentiment, you see."

Bel nods, not trusting itself to speak. Deep inside, its embarrassing inner child wonders whether maybe there will be a Martillo class cruiser waiting for them at Jackson's Whole.

 

 

 


End file.
